Imagine being greeted at your classroom door with this bright welcome.

An Elephant ALWAYS Remembers!

As you get settle into your classroom routine, you look forward to your chance to take center stage and have a seat in the 'Elephant Author Chair.' How incredibly cute is that? Child sized rocker UpCycled and refurbished and given some delightful ears!!

Wait till you see what Heather-the-first-year-teacher made for her beginning of the new year bulletin board welcome!

She told me that she got a LARGE piece of canvas and lots of paint and created her own patchwork-Elmer, complete with three dimensional ear! Heather was oh-so-kind to get this beauty out of storage so that I could share it here with you. I'd guess that it was at least 8 feet across.

Here's a close up of Heather's incredible labor of love!

AWESOME!!!

Is this THE.MOST.INCREDIBLE.ELMER. you have ever seen?

It's at times like this that I wish I could bestow a 'RainbowsWithinReach' Award!! This level of passion deserves recognition. Don't you agree?

Imagine my excitement to see this handwritten "Q" list.......

Just as I'm about to share my 'quilt' illustrations with the children!

Here we are posing: Moi, Heather --the Elmer painter-- and Super MANny that brought us together.

Super MANny is a premmie AND now a cancer survivor!

He's oh-so-fortunate to have landed in Heather's elephant room!!!

This is "Read Across America Week."

What are you reading?

I'm headed up to Tennessee in a couple days to make my polka-dotted Author/Illustrator school-visit in Nashville!!

Mrs. Waldmiller of Fairport, NY just ordered my entire set of picture books and I was more than happy to personalize them for her family of four girls. She 'found' me via Pinterest while searching for Dr. Seuss ideas. Have I mentioned recently how much I LUV LUV LUV Pinterest? This weekend I crossed the threshold of 100,000 P followers!

Sunday, February 24, 2013

(Thank you Kaci Hoffer for taking the screen shot and sending it to my slow-internet-camp-connection eyeballs!)

I have been given the responsibility of giving the opening KEYNOTE for SDE'sannual "I Teach K" conference!

This is BIG-TIME news!

I'm ready to start the celebration a few months early.

I can't wait to see dear friends + make new ones.

Enjoy some happy thoughts from the past.

It feels like I've been called up from the minors.

Unfurl into the unknown!

"I am a rainbow..........." indeed!

"Creativity takes COURAGE."

"We are what we REPEATEDLY do."

In 'real-time' I am helping to lead the concluding worship service at an amazing RETREAT Conference for FL-UMAP. What an amazingly exhausting time of rejuvenation and recharging. If you've ever been on a retreat -- you know what I mean by that.

Have an incredible week and let your imagination run wild. I've been preparing for this opportunity for the last 17 years (and another decade or more before that.) That's sort of like the 17 year cicada. I was just having that cicada conversation with WonderBoy just the other day. Little did I realize that it was actually a parable ABOUT ME! Get ready VEGAS here I come!!! Seventeen years of preparation means I have a LOT of NOISE to make. JOYOUSLY. With VIGOR.

-- Debbie --

We will use VEGAS as the gen-u-ine launch of our brand new Early Education Emporium of resources to the wider world! If there's anything that I've learned in my cicada-like journey, it is that collaboration is how things get done. Pop over to shop in your jammies for resources by some of the best-of-the-best!

Look what I saw recently. These fingers were hard at work at the Childhood League Center -- the site of my very first professional contract. I was hired in 1979 as a "Resource Teacher." This is where I started. I provided art and music experiences for young children with special needs. I also wore every other 'extra hat' that was needed in this small, private center. It was the best training I could ever receive! Over time I was promoted into administrative responsibilities -- which led to my eventual transition to launching my own company:: Rainbows!Decades later the center is in a new building, still serving children. Still filled with excellence at every corner. Take a look at these fingers hard at work.

Much of the US is currently socked in with the latest snow storm. I was able to fly out before the big accumulations mounted and have landed again in our adopted snowbird state of FL. These little igloo sculptures would be fun -- regardless of your location. Look at all of this fine motor development taking place under the banner of 'look-what-I'm-doing!!'

These were on a winter bulletin board display in the neighboring county.

Here's a couple of oh-so-glorious MELTED snowmen that 'remain' from media exploration with young fingers. These were made in the 'toddler-room' at the Center and were proudly on display. How cute are the snowman remnants?

Each one makes me smile just a little more. What a brilliant mixture of 'process' and open-ended art concluding with a delightful product for the refrigerator.

As I type, hubby is driving us to Leesburg, FL where I have the responsibility of giving the KEYNOTE tonight for the state-wide UMAP conference. It's an early childhood retreat at a church camp! Talk about going back to my roots!! Have a great weekend. I know I will. That's my plan.

Wednesday, February 20, 2013

SNOW PEOPLEHow cute are these little characters? In real time I am waving good-bye to the snow and winter-wind of the still so very frozen mid-west. My daughter is well on the road to recovery from her most recent surgery. I've hugged my WonderPeeps good-bye and slatered them with Scrumble-Kisses. I am in fact winging my way south -- returning to the sand, sun and palm trees of our adopted snowbird state of Florida. Bring it on!This little snow family was created by my very own set of wonders at an evening of 'church friends.' So WonderBoy and the Twinzees each had the opportunity to make their own. Do you just LUV LUV LUV the stove-pipe hats? Think recycling. Think pudding containers!! Think lots of fun. A little imagination makes these buddies similar, but not the same. You can tell they belong to each other. Its a family of snow-people! The trick is to have plenty of do-dads and jimmy-jinks for the embellishment part of the creative process! Buttons, baubles, pom-poms, fabric-bit-for-a-scarf and of course the piece de resistance: WIGGLY EYES! Here's a delightful winter-rhyme that is brilliant for number play that I just saw up here on my Author/Illustrator school visit while in the tundra.

Wonder what the airport will be like in the midst of yet more snow?

Think good thoughts for my travel.

I have a keynote to deliver on Friday!

-- Debbie --

Yes! I have a store!!

Please follow my little store over at Teachers Pay Teachers to get the latest new on my conversion of my songs to Mp3 format with support material. Are you ready to think about spring and metamorphosis? I am!!! I have some seriously big new in the wings.